5 Tips for How to Get Sponsored on Instagram?

Believe it or not, you don’t have to be a star to make money on social media. In fact, pulling in a six-figure income on Instagram is becoming a pretty common occurrence!

How can posting online generate income, you ask? Actually, in more ways than one. However, perhaps the most lucrative source of income on Instagram comes from sponsorships.

If you’re on a mission to get sponsored on Instagram and start pulling in the big bucks from the comforts of your home, you’ve come to the right place. Follow along to learn 5 simple tips you can use to attract Instagram sponsors and land life-changing contracts for your online career.

What Are Sponsored Instagram Posts?

Before we jump into landing sponsored Instagram deals; we first need to understand what exactly these posts, ads, and campaigns are involved.

A sponsored post or ad essentially means that you, as an influencer, have been paid by the company to promote or talk about their product or service. While this nearly sounds too good to be true, the fact is that these sponsorships are mutually beneficial.

At the end of the day, consumers trust the people they know, and although your followers may not know you in real life, their connection with your social media presence makes it feel like they do. Because of this, your opinions and thoughts about nearly anything hold a lot more weight. This is especially true when it comes to products.

Brands reap the benefits of this by paying you to talk about their product to a group of influential buyers that they may not have reached otherwise. And of course, even if they had, the positive reviews from you hold a lot more weight than their own ads and posts.

The brand then benefits from your audience and influence, you benefit financially from the deal, and your followers benefit from the product you’ve brought to their attention.

Of course, this comes with an immense amount of responsibility. As a trusted influencer, you’ll need to be sure you only push what you truly believe in so your followers never feel taken advantage of.

How to Get Sponsored on Instagram

Now that you know what sponsorships on Instagram really are, you’re probably dying to land your first contract. While the number of followers you have doesn’t necessarily sway your chances, there are a few key elements that can increase your chances.

1. Present a Solid Brand

First things first, you’ll need a clear and concise brand in order for any business to take you seriously. Fortunately, this isn’t all that hard to accomplish on Instagram’s platform. All you need to do is create an image that matches what you stand for and gives followers an easy and accurate impression at the first glance.

Here are a few ways to build your brand:

Understand Your Audience

Without a clear understanding of your target audience, you’ll have no choice but to bounce around testing and trying different approaches. By carving out your target audience and getting to know them on a personal level, you’ll know exactly what they want to see.

This then frees up your time and energy to give your posts and content a distinct and unique branded vibe. What’s more, is that your audience’s preferences will help you shape what this brand looks like as well. This can make it easier to achieve and maintain in the long run.

Be a Consistent Poster

Next, you’ll need to establish consistency online by posting often. Not only do you need to be active every day, but you’ll also need to time your posts around when your audience is online and ready to engage. Your analytics will help you determine the best times for your unique audience.

And of course, your consistency shouldn’t just be on your feed either. With Instagram branching into mini platforms with reels and stories, you’ll need to round out your approach to be seen on every Instagram element.

This may mean posting a reel, sharing a feed post, and jumping on stories 2-3 times throughout the day to boost it all. While this is a serious time commitment, the results are definitely worth it.

Relate Everything Back to Branding

Finally, everything you post should be easily and seamlessly related to your brand.

Following the latest trend on reels? Do it in a unique way that expresses who you are. The same goes for sharing about popular topics, and yes – your sponsored Instagram posts.

Your users should be able to tell that a post is from you before they even read your name. This is done by using specific filters, color schemes, and of course, branded captions.

2. Have a Loyal, Engaged Following

As we mentioned earlier, you don’t necessarily need millions of followers to attract great brands for sponsorship. What you do need, however, is an engaged audience.

Businesses want to see that you are not only popular on Instagram, but really connecting with those accounts. The more involved and connected your followers feel, the more likely they’ll take your opinions to heart and make a purchase from a brand you recommend.

The best way to do this is to get interacting with your followers. Have you received a message from a fan, answer it – and fast! The same goes for comments, likes, and shares. In fact, even if your followers aren’t commenting, engaging with them through their page is a great way to build stronger relationships and appear in their newsfeed more often.

3. Start Promoting and Tagging Now

There are a few rules you’ll have to follow when posting, commenting, and sharing on sponsored Instagram posts. If you aren’t experienced with sponsorships, this can be an intimidating task and can make it harder to do them well.

To send the impression to future potential sponsors, start practicing these techniques by putting them into play now. Tag businesses in your posts and recommend products to your followers – even if you aren’t being paid for it.

While this sounds counter-intuitive, the posts will start to get your audience used to seeing this type of content and make taking on sponsored posts more natural and genuine. Beyond this, when brands start seeing you promoting their products or even other brands, they’ll take notice and keep an eye on you as a potential promoter.

And of course, because you are posting at your own free will, you’ll have the freedom to only share the brands and products that you truly believe in. This sets the stage for future sponsors to find you and seek out your services in the specific niche you already represent.

What’s more, is that this genuine sharing is good practice for sticking to your values and morals later on.

4. Let Them Come to You

Believe it or not, businesses are constantly looking for great influencers to team up with. This means you can actually draw great brands and sponsorships to you just by being your genuine and unique self.

Of course, you’ll have to give these brands a chance to find you first.

To do this, customize your hashtag usage and geotags to match the brands that you are most interested in. By upping your visibility to their target audience, they’ll begin to take note of your posts and how users are engaging with them.

Another great way to draw attention is to look at influencers that are being sponsored by your target brand and mimicking their successful approach. Of course, this only works when you apply your own unique brand to the approach – otherwise, you’re just recycling content.

Adopt their hashtags and geotags and find inspiration from their popular posts.

5. Pitch to Your Dream Brands

Is there a brand that you just know your audience would love as much as you do? If you’re having trouble catching their eye organically, it might be time to work on your pitch.

While there’s no hard and fast rule to approaching brands for sponsored Instagram ads, most influencers find going in with a confident voice and clear expectations are the formula for success. Know your worth before you approach the company and let them know why you feel the partnership would be ideal.

At the end of the day, when your niche and image line up well with a brand, they’ll see the value in investing in you and take a chance. After all, they want genuine, organic promotion just as much as you do!